In an act of celebration, bravado, or maybe alcohol-induced insanity, Jake Strangelove stands on the top pipe of the playground swing set, still wearing his graduation gown. He backflips as he had done so many times before, but this time, he lands on his neck. Five years later, Jake’s life and death still haunt his family, especially his sister Jaycee and dozens of their friends.

Cori McCarthy explores Jaycee’s mangled life and that of her companions as they mark the fifth anniversary of Jakes leap into mortality. Fortunately, Natalie Cheng, daughter of an Ohio University psychologist, provides a running commentary on the mental state of Jake and his mourners.

Jake was left-handed, ADHD, and more than a little dyslectic. “Kids with learning disabilities often act out because of their frustration.” Professor Cheng told Natalie, “The neural insulation of your frontal lobe won’t be finished developing until you’re in your mid-twenties. You’re not fully aware of the consequences of your actions.” No wonder insurance companies want to charge higher rates for drivers under the age of twenty-five. Jake and all sub-mid-twenties humans remain half-baked when it comes to filtering out destructive impulses.

Jaycee Strangelove describes herself as a damaged girl with no hobbies, no passions, and no future. In fact, she shares a hobby with her late brother and Mik, one of their friends: Urbex or urban exploration.  Specifically, they visit the ruins of The Ridges, a shuttered, gothic, perhaps haunted insane asylum, Randall Park Mall a once illustrious but now abandoned shopping center, Geauga Lake, the shambles of what had been a huge amusement park and two other sites regularly explored by Jake. Their goal is to find traces of Jake’s presence—messages he left behind to commemorate his acts of daring.

The adventures begin on the night of Jaycee’s high school graduation. She drags along her classmates, Natalie, Zach, and Bishop. Mik meets them inside The Ridges’ dusty, relic strewn “lobotomy-central”–the first stop in the summer hunt for Jake-signs across the state of Ohio.

Cori McCarthy enlists the graphic artist Sonia Liao to speak for Mik and Bishop. Mik, a selective mute rarely verbalizes, so the chapters he narrates—appearing as portions of a graphic novel—uniquely link the prose chapters and amplify the noir quality of the novel. Bishop, a graffiti aficionado, summarizes moods of the moment throughout the book.

The characters represent tortured souls with no spiritual framework and no help from their families. Bishop grieves his lost lover after her cruel rejection. Natalie calculates how she will dump Zach although she still craves his bed. More and more, Zach takes refuge in alcohol. Jaycee lives to reunite with Jake while Mik, in many ways acts as a superhero but can’t even whisper his feelings for Jaycee. All of them have secrets involving Jake and his death that they may or may not divulge during the critical summer between high school graduation and the college-induced diaspora.

Can Cori McCarthy write her way out of this corner? What could reconcile and normalize the strains and unspoken yearnings before the last sunset of summer?

 

A retired biologist with current interests in vegetable gardening, volunteering at a local nursing home, reading, and writing. Other activities include the study of the practical aspects of applied Gerontology, splitting logs, digging for quahogs and writing blogs. https://dmulcare.wordpress.com/

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